


Long Journey Home

by indefensibleselfindulgence



Category: Castlevania (Cartoon), 悪魔城ドラキュラ | Castlevania Series
Genre: Abuse, Biting, Blood Drinking, Canon-Typical Violence, Carmilla Is Her Own Warning, Character Study, Crossdressing, Emotional Manipulation, F/M, Humiliation, Immobilization, Manipulation, Nudity, Other, Self Loathing, Sickness, Submission, Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-01
Updated: 2018-11-01
Packaged: 2019-08-14 01:32:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16483547
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/indefensibleselfindulgence/pseuds/indefensibleselfindulgence
Summary: “Why are you being... kind now?”“No sense in running you ragged so far from home. If you drop dead then what use are you to me?”It's reassuring in the worst kind of way.





	Long Journey Home

**Author's Note:**

> this is weird idk
> 
> listen this isn't as morally reprehensible as it could be but it's still pretty morally reprehensible 
> 
> not beta'd

His feet are bleeding in his boots by the time they stop for the morning.  
  
He expects her to keep him outside during the day. Make him sleep in the slowly melting snow. He doesn't mind, honestly. Hypothermia isn't that painful of a way to go. But no, she pulls him inside and hitches him to her bed like the horse she rode in on.  
  
“Come now, you have no one but yourself to blame.” Her hands are cold when they touch his bruised skin. “Try not to look so miserable about it.”  
  
He can barely stand, muscles shaking from the strain and the cold and she must be able to tell because she makes a pleased sound and pats the bed next to her.  
  
He feels like he should stand, but his body all but falls forward until he's forced to sit by her side.  
  
“I suppose you're not meant for walking.” She says, and with a wave of her hand, his boots are off of his feet and by the doorway. “Look at you.” He keeps his gaze trained firmly on the dirt floor, submissive, weak, whatever she wants- anything to keep her from attacking him again. “Scared little lamb.” Her claws nick the side of his face, and he jolts at the pain.  
  
He hasn't eaten. He hasn't had water. His clothes are filthy, and his feet are bleeding.  
  
Her hand is in his hair again, and he thinks he might start crying.  
  
She's sitting on the bed, and he's standing in front of her, chained to one of the posts, and he doesn't know how this happened to him.  
  
“Get on your knees.” He does, slower then he's sure she wants. “Poor you.” She says and twists his dirty hair around her fingers. “I'm sorry.” She whispers. “Lot's of pent-up rage, you understand.” She doesn't sound very apologetic at all. “I won't make you walk _all_ the way home.”  
  
He would drop dead of exhaustion in just a few more days. But he's sure she knows that. He wants it either way.  
  
“Should we get you cleaned up?”  He doesn't want to say anything- he's not even sure if he can at this point. His throat feels raw. But when he doesn't answer, she grabs his chin and forces him to look her in the eyes, fingers pressing against the ugly bruises she left there. “Have you gone deaf? I'm sure I didn't hit you _that_ hard.”  
  
He shakes his head as far as he can in her grip and she lets him go, his body sagging down on his knees with a thud and his joints ache from his weight alone.  
  
He doesn't know how much time passes before she hauls him up by the collar and drags him to another tent before she leaves again and two of her soldiers strip him naked and shove him into a bath. It shocks him out of his stupor for long enough to watch a vampire take his clothes away, the clothing Dracula gave him, away.  
  
By the time they come to retrieve him, the water is ruddy, but he feels more- awake? Functional?  
  
The sun isn't warm enough to melt the snow away, even if their camp wasn't in the shade of tall trees. He's shivering by the time they march him back to her tent naked. She looks up at him from her travel desk and sighs.  
  
“You look like a drowned cat.” He doesn't say anything in return, and she sighs again, deeper this time, pointing at a plate of something on the table. “Hurry up.” She tells him.

He hurries up.  
  
He's pretty sure he's eating a person if only judging from the small smile on her face. He gulps the water down, too quickly and almost vomits before pulling himself together. Pulling himself vaguely together. He doesn't feel very much like a person.  
  
“Are we going to talk now?”  
  
“I don't have anything to say.”  
  
“Mm.” He finishes eating, and she finishes working, and she calls him over to undo her dress for her.

It takes him a moment to realize where the lacing is and where the clasps of her armor are, and he can feel her irritation in ever passing second. He can barely manage the metal but it comes loose. The dress takes even longer.  
  
They're both naked now. She carries it with a sense of pride, he can tell, her stance shifts in her hips, and her posture loosens, barely. He can only imagine what he looks like standing next to her.

“I don't allow many men into my bed.” She tells him when they're forced to press against each other in the small distance. He's freezing next to her. “You should be honored.”  
  
“Why are you being... kind now?”  
  
“No sense in running you ragged so far from home. If you drop dead then what use are you to me?”  
  
It's reassuring in the worst kind of way. 

  
…

  
She has the chain of his collar in her hand along with the horse's bridal. He rides with her, and it's awkward, too often does he end up pressed against her back when she brings the horse to a halt, and he's beginning to think she's doing it on purpose just to startle him.  
  
There isn't a lot to do on the road either then stare ahead and dread Wallachia's borders. Even as his eyes adjust to the darkness, there is little he can make out on his own.  
  
He doesn't know where his clothes are, his original armor or his boots or his tunic, but he's dressed in her colors now.  
  
He's hers now.  
  
It's a few nights of idle riding and a few days of sharing a bed in her tent, and even if she hasn't hit him again, he's still horrified to say anything, do anything that would make her angry again.  
  
Her nails scratch at his arms while shes falling in and out of sleep. He doesn't know what that means, but the scars will probably last until he dies. However soon that would be.  
  
They come upon a town in the middle of the night. More of a village really, and she sends her troops ahead, and he dreads the worst.  
  
“I'm hungry.” She tells him while she steps down from the horse and picks him up with one hand. “Why don't we play a game?”  
  
“A game?”  
  
“Go and retrieve a pretty girl for me.” She slides him five coins. “And if I like her, I'll give you something.”  
  
“What am I supposed to do with the money?” She just laughs, pulls his collar off and nudges him forward.  
  
He's not stupid enough to try anything. Even hungry, she's a monster worse than any he's ever created. She's faster then anything he's ever created. She'll rip through the entire village just to find him if she has too.  
  
There's a bar, and a brothel and the money in his hand makes sense all of a sudden. It all feels exceptionally cruel, so he swallows and heads into the brothel to get this entire thing over with as fast as he possibly can.  
  
The madam of the house takes one look at his coins and calls the girls who aren't working. He doesn't think any of them are pretty, but he picks the pale redhead and hands over all of the money so that she would follow him into the woods. The girl asks what his name is and he tells her it's Isaac.  
  
“There you are, dear.” She stares the girl up and down and smiles wide enough that her fangs are a stark contrast to her stained lips. “The camp has been worried sick.”  
  
He doesn't bother playing along. She isn't really going to drag it out, is she?  
  
She seats the girl on the horse and gets on behind her.  
  
“Follow along, won't you, Isaac?”  
  
He's never seen two women have sex before, but he sits in the corner of the tent with nowhere to go, and watches them. It's a beautiful confluence of bodies until she grows bored of playing with her food and rips the girl's head off, a torrent of blood covering her and the sheets and she laughs and laughs and laughs.  
  
When riding the next day, she seats him in front of her on the saddle now like she had with girl, and presses against his back to hold the bridle.  
  
“Hold your hands out.” He cups his hands in front of him, and she drops a small kestrel into them. He almost drops the dead bird out of shock, but she brushes his hair out of the way and rests her head on his shoulder. “For doing a good job.” She whispers in his ear.  
  
He wonders if she can feel him crying or not. 

  
…

  
She gives him the coins she ripped out of his hammer, and he knocks them together and the kestrel springs back to life, its claws digging into his hand and feathers soft against his skin.  
  
“Am I going to get the hammer back?”  
  
“A new one. You'll love it.”  
  
“Right.” He gives her his coins back, and she twists them around, trying to divine something from them. “They don't mean anything. I stole them from my father when I was younger, that's all.”  
  
“Poor little magpie.”  She teases, and the kestrel shoots out of his hands into the woods. “Is that when you killed them?”  
  
“You know?”  
  
“Dracula made sure everyone knew. He was proud of you for it.”  
  
“I locked them inside and set the house on fire.” He says and waits for his new friend to come flying back to him. “They killed my dog.”  
  
“Killed it again, you mean?” There's no response to that, and the bird lands on his shoulder, something's blood dripping down on his lap while it preens. “You know, killing cruel people is an admirable trait.”  
  
“Then why are you so scared of the Belmonts?”  
  
He's grateful the ground is covered in freshly fallen snow because the speed she kicks him off with would have cracked every bone in his body on the landing. Everything is already starting to swell. He doesn't know what he was expecting to happen- too comfortable. Too comfortable.

He's grown lazy in his compliance.

Forgotten how she beat him with an inch of his life.  
  
She walks over once she gets off of her horse, picks him up by the hair and slams his head down into the dirt again. And again. And again.  
  
He's bleeding, and her eyes are red. There's hesitation before she drops him from her grasp and gets back on her horse.  
  
He walks behind.  
  
He learns his lesson.  
  
No Belmonts.  
  
No Questions. 

  
…

  
They're near the border when she gets hungry again.  
  
He doesn't know where or when the others feed. If they feed at all. He's pretty far removed from anything that isn't her these days.  
  
“Let's play a game again.” She tells him. Now that they're on speaking terms. He wants to tell her it wasn't much of a game last time but the lesson sticks. “Bring me someone that would be missed.”  
  
“A woman?”  
  
“Obviously.”  
  
And that's all he gets before she sends him off again.  
  
This town is even smaller than the last, still rebuilding from the war. Half of the buildings are collapsed and he sees children playing in the ruins. The sun has only just dimmed, and people still mill around the city center. A mother chases after her children, three old men are drinking on a bench by a fountain, a couple is taking an evening walk.  
  
He doesn't have money to offer them. He isn't a good liar. He supposes he could always beg.  
  
He doesn't understand why she doesn't just feed off of him.  
  
A woman his age waves a hand in front of his face.  
  
“You alright?”  
  
“Ah- yes. Just lost.” He mumbles. “Apologies.”  
  
“Oh, it's alright.” She smiles. “Where are you trying to head? Maybe I can take you?”  
  
“It's out in the-” He points at the woods. “My camp.” It's all short and terse and nervous. His hands shake behind him. “My-” Owner? Coconspirator? Friend? Associate? “My sister told me to fetch- dinner.”  
  
“Oh, I can sort you. My farm's out that way.” She smiles. “Help me carry this, and I'll be more than happy.” He didn't even notice the two massive jugs she had in her hands, and he rushes to take them from her.  
  
Heavier then they look.  
  
The woman is talkative, and she has three brothers who all work at their father's farm. She goes into town to sell the milk.  
  
“Isaac there you are.” He looks up to see her by the horse. The woman laughs and tells them both that she forgot to ask what his name was.  
  
“It's alright.” He tells her. He's not too attached to it anyway.  
  
He stays outside the tent this time, sitting in the cold snow and watching the gooseflesh show on his arms. He doesn't want to watch whatever is happening to the woman. He can hear it just fine, but he doesn't have to look.  
  
“Isaac.” She's standing over him, naked and covered in crimson. “Be a dear, change the sheets would you?” He gets up and hauls the corpse outside while she watches with a smile on her face. 

  
…

  
The Kingdom of Hungary isn't any different from any other place they've been.  
  
It's still cold, still miserable.  
  
She invites him to bathe in a river once the stop at the banks of one for the day.  
  
“It's good for you.” She says.  
  
“And running water?”  
  
“Good for _you_.” She repeats like he's simple.  
  
She has weird rituals she adheres too. Their games, when he goes into small towns and robs them of their women. Their riding, where he has to be in front because she doesn't trust him anywhere else. Their sleeping arrangements, chest to chest where she can hear his every move. Playing with his hair.

She really likes his hair.  
  
She likes watching him when he bathes too. He has no idea why.  
  
For all their forced intimacy, he's not interested in her, and she doesn't seem to actually be interested in him.  
  
He's a convenience for her.    
  
That's all he is.  
  
His bird dives into the water and pulls out a fish while he gets out of the clothes she's given him and steps into the river.  
  
The water is cold and hard against his legs, but it'll serve him better not to make her wait. She sits on the beach and stares at him by the time he gets his head under water to get his hair clean. The current is fast today, and the rocks on the bottom of the river get swept up along and cut his legs. The water feels good, though. He can get the smell of the last body off of him.

She stares at him as he gets out of the river, shivering.  
  
“I left something on my bed. Go put it on.” He stalks up to camp without his clothes, and with nothing to dry off with.  
  
The gown is beautiful, and the silk catches on his hands. He slides into it easily enough, and it drags on the dirt floor. She's taller than him, after all. He doesn't know what the point of this is either, but when she enters the tent, she's seems pleased. She walks over and puts a hand on his waist, running it up along his side, tugging the the neckline a little lower and taking a step back to look him over.  
  
“You could pass for a woman.”  
  
His blood runs cold.  
  


…

  
His hair starts getting longer.    
  
Before it was just an irritant but now, with the looming threat of becoming a meal for her, he sneaks out of the tent during the day, at noon, and even if he's tired and borderline delirious from fear, he finds a knife and cuts his hair short. It's uneven, choppy, he can feel it already, and she's going to be livid.  
  
Her eyes are open when he comes back to the tent, and she lifts the blanket up for him. He hesitates and debates stepping back into the sun, stealing a horse and running, finding a river and running through that too, just to be safe. But even if he could get away now, that would only make things worse later. So he gets into bed, trembling, trying to explain but it comes out scratchy and rushed. His throat hurts.  
  
She shushes him, a petting hand on his shoulder.  
  
“You're warm.” She says after a moment and it shocks him more then the yelling would have.  
  
“I think I'm sick.” He tells her. And maybe he is, from all the snow he's been in lately. All the frozen rivers. "Hypothermia."  
  
She doesn't mention his hair.  
  
They both know it makes her mad beyond reason that he would do this to himself. That he would do this to her property. But she can't beat him if he's sick. He's human. He's weak. He's weaker than usual, and that might be the only thing keeping him breathing right now. 

She shushes him again and pulls him closer then usual. Her cold body is a reprieve from the mounting heat, from the cloying unrelenting fever but he can't find comfort in the gesture. Her hand rests on his hip.

Maybe if he apologizes he can get ahead of it- some what ahead of it but when he opens his mouth, she squeezes what little fat he still has on him.

"Be quiet."

He shuts up.

  
…

  
He is, it turns out, very sick.  
  
Sick enough that she sends the rest of the troops ahead and they spend three days in their tent alone.

He slips in and out of consciousness and can't tell his nightmares apart from reality,  all of it bleeds together until the only thing he's capable of thinking off is her.

Her.

Her.

Her.

There are times when he can't breathe, and she has to hold him still, bent over the edge of the bed so he can cough his lungs out and vomit at the same time. She hauls snow in, waits for it to melt and washes the sick off of him, hissing abuse at him that he can barely hear. She hates doing this.

But it's not like she can find someone else to replace him.

They're alone in the woods, singular tent, one horse.

At one point, while she's out trying to find something he can keep down for five seconds, men find him. The loud noise of ugly humans makes his head split open. They find her clothing and tell him they'll wait for his pretty rich wife to come so that they could do awful things to her and then do awful things to him and make her watch. He laughs so hard his cough carries blood with it.

What a joke.

She rips them open and paints the canvas with their insides and when he tells her what they promised to do she laughs too.

They're alone.  
  
Alone for the most part.  
  
She brings a healer she met while she was hunting for his food that he can't keep down. The man gives him one look and backs out of the tent before her nails dig in hard enough to make the man bleed through his shirt.  
  
The healer tells her that if his fever doesn't break in five days, he will die, and to thank the healer for the trouble, she rips his head off and drinks from it like a fountain.  
  
He's shaking by the time the sun comes back up, desperate full body tremors and she hates because every few seconds his body is wracked with vibrations that keep her awake.  
  
She doesn't like being awake when the sun is out.  
  
He doesn't like being awake at all anymore.  
  
She brings in packs of snow and places them against his forehead, so his brain doesn't boil alive, and he leans into all of her cold touches.  
  
If she's amused by the new attention, she doesn't show it. 

They're both tired with him.

  
…

  
His fever breaks despite all his prayers to the contrary.  
  
She grins against his neck the entire ride to the next camp.  
  
“I don't mind your hair like this.” She tells him when he throws up his dinner, the remnants of the sickness making itself known. “I've thought about it. It'll grow back.”  
  
“I didn't get sick on purpose.” He feels like he needs to tell her. “I can't do that.”  
  
“You can do so many great things.” She says, and the ride again. “Why are you shaking again puppy?”

He doesn't know why she bothers asking.

It's not like he does anything else lately.  
  

  
…

  
They're in Austria so much faster then he wanted to be.  
  
He's in one of her gowns again, with his choppy hair up and out of the way. She paints his face with rouge and kohl.  
  
He can't stop shaking.  
  
“Let's play a game.” She says.  
  
“Please.” He begs.  
  
“You're a fair maiden come to your queen, begging to be turned. Because you know the war is over. And your life is mine either way. So why not share it.”  
  
“Please.” He begs again.  
  
“I tell you I don't mind. That you're beautiful in your own peculiar way and even if you're young, I'm sure I can find something to do with you. But you have to make it worth my while. How are you going to make it worth my while?”  
  
He can't run, he can't do anything, and while half of him is shutting down, the other half debates how bad it'll be. Worse. Worse than all the others because she kills them at the end. She lets them go. She needs her forge master more then she needs a quick meal.

She needs him more then anything else.  
  
“Are you going to pay me with something? To sweeten the deal?” She's getting impatient. He wants to run. He wants to run and he almost tries to before he remembers that the gown is too long and he'll probably trip and break his neck. Even if he runs, where does he go? He's weak. He's human.  
  
He shifts the neckline of the gown down from his shoulders.  
  
“That's rather forward.” She says, eyes painting over crimson. He pushes one of the sleeves up and giver her his wrist. “Better.” She tells him and takes his hand to sit down on the bed next to him.  
  
She traces the scars she left on his wrists with something almost resembling affection.

Once she sinks her teeth into him, he feels fire shoot up his arm and down his spine.  
  
Paralytic venom.  
  
That's why the women didn't run.  
  
That's why the women didn't scream.  
  
Everything hurts, and he can't see straight anymore while she drinks her fill of him.  
  
“Darling, the process of turning is a long and arduous one, and if you're so shaken up after a little bite, I just don't know if this is worth it.”  
  
He can't move. He can't talk. He can't do any fucking thing other than sit like a doll.  
  
“Why don't we try your neck, like you wanted?” Claws run over his jugular, and there is nothing he can do but wait to be a meal. “I won't tell anyone if you don't.”  
  
His head is muddled with something, and his body is on fire.  
  
He's going to die.  
  
He feels like a tiny mouse underhand of the world's angriest cat. Her claws dig into his thighs, sharp enough to pierce the fabric. She has her fill after another few minutes, and the edges of his vision is shooting stars, and his fingers are numb and filled with needles.  
  
She kisses the side of his neck, and for once her lips are warm.  
  
Warm with him.  
  
“Such a brave maiden you are.” He feels tugging at his hair and his bangs cover his eyes some. “You must hate humans so much to turn against them. Or maybe you just hate yourself.”  
  
Could be both, he thinks. And more. He could hate vampires just as much.  
  
“If you're nice, when I turn you, you can sleep in my bed.” She whispers into his ear. “You can feed from me. We would hunt together. Hunt, all those nasty little humans who ever hurt you.”  
  
He groans, and she pauses.  
  
His tongue is heavy, and his lips are lead but still.  
  
“I killed them already,” It comes out slurred. “And I'll kill you too.”  
  
It takes her a moment, maybe to realize what he said before she smiles against his other shoulder.  
  
“Oh kitten, I'd love to see you try.”  
  
He expects another bite, but he's immobile and she must realize the opportunity as soon as he does.  She drags him into her lap and hitches the gown up to his thighs. 

"There's another vein." She tells him. "That so few people know about." Her fingers are freezing against his legs. He can barely swallow.

He's dumped on the bed and the gown is pushes up to his chest when she gets between his legs. He can't see her anymore, not over the bundle of fabric in front of his eyes.

"Let's see if I can find it on the first try."

For a moment he fears the worst, but no- she really isn't interested. He's just a meal for her. Just a multi functional tool of convenience. She bites down on his legs more times then he can count because the pain just grows and grows and grows and by the time she settles on what she was looking for the sheets are stained crimson. She drinks from him like he's a fountain that will never run dry and he thinks she's going to kill him.

To actually kill him, or her venom is going to stop his brain or his heart or his lungs and he might as well be dead then.

When she's had her fill she lays down next to him and he can barely process anything.

Just cold at his side.

"If you would just keep your mouth shut." She loosens his hair and lets it fall. "You could be such a pretty little thing. Seen and not heard. Let's try that next time."

Next time.

He doesn't know what he should have expected.

"If you'll be a good girl, I'll even get you off next time."

He should have burned with his parents.

…

  
His new room is larger than his old one.  
  
His new forgery is larger than his old one.  
  
His new hammer is weighted better than his old one.  
  
And there are mountains of corpses to work through.  
  
 He doesn't turn to look at her. Her guards haul a body onto his table, and he lifts the hammer up over his head. Blue sparks come springing out of the fire, scattering across the ground across the room.  
  
The night child is a massive hulking thing, and it swings at him once it opens its eyes for the first time. He puts a hand to its forehead, and it stills. His bird sits on its perch and watches him point at the pile of bodies. It flies out and lands on a thin woman, pecking the remnants of her eyes out and the night child ushers it away so it can pick the body up and place it on the table.  
  
He knows the work.  
  
He can do the work.  
  
Finally, he looks over his shoulder, and she's leaning on the door frame, a look of awe on her face.

Almost like she forgot what she dragged him across snow and forest for.  
  
“Carmilla.”

"Hector."

**Author's Note:**

> comments are always encouraged and very very very appreciated
> 
>  
> 
> [ yell at me here](http://iamalivenow.tumblr.com/)


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